


Meet You at the Statue

by bribitribbit



Category: Harry Potter - Fandom
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2010-08-27
Updated: 2010-08-27
Packaged: 2017-10-11 06:46:55
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,202
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/109605
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/bribitribbit/pseuds/bribitribbit
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The One-Eyed Witch sees more than you think.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Meet You at the Statue

**Author's Note:**

> [](http://greensweaterlj.livejournal.com/profile)[**greensweaterlj**](http://greensweaterlj.livejournal.com/) and [](http://jazzyjello.livejournal.com/profile)[**jazzyjello**](http://jazzyjello.livejournal.com/) are two INCREDIBLE people and awesome friends and a lot of thanks to them for helping me through writing this and beta-ing. Also to [](http://icybright.livejournal.com/profile)[**icybright**](http://icybright.livejournal.com/) for putting up with my spazzing. :) Loooove. This is inspired by Belle and Sebastian's [**"Piazza, New York Catcher"**](http://www.mediafire.com/?emybdgjxxdf) and some phrases, themes, etc. are borrowed from that song. Also important to the fic is [**"The Young Man's Song"**](http://www.poets.org/viewmedia.php/prmMID/19412) (or also "Brown Penny") by W.B. Yeats. This is not a happy fic, by the way! [](http://greensweaterlj.livejournal.com/profile)[**greensweaterlj**](http://greensweaterlj.livejournal.com/) feels I should warn you all about that.

_Oh, elope with me in private and we'll set something ablaze  
A trail for the devil to erase._  
\- "Piazza, New York Catcher," by Belle &amp; Sebastian

_I whispered, "I am too young,"  
And then, "I am old enough";  
Wherefore I threw a penny  
To find out if I might love_  
\- "The Young Man's Song," by W.B. Yeats

~*~

  
_Meet me at the statue in an hour._

These are the only words written on the yellowed parchment, in loopy but precise handwriting and green ink, yet they manage to send a sharp, piercing thrill of hope through Remus's stomach. It is all so familiar, and he feels warm and lighthearted--a feeling too rare to abandon for the sake of reason.

This could be some kind of lie. Remus is aware of this. The little slip of parchment could have very easily escaped from between pages forty-two and forty-three of some book in the stacks which Sirius kept on the windowsill, and then floated softly, swiftly through the air until it landed on Remus's bedspread.

He's not going to let this small possibility deduct from the greater impossibility that it might be _true._

Remus puts on his coat, deftly pulls his umbrella out of the troll's leg by the door, and waits for the Knight Bus to Hogsmeade.

~*~

  
"There's got to be some way to get inside," Sirius said, crouched over on his bed, jabbing his quill at the parchment laid out on his thigh.

"We don't even know if there's anything to get inside to, anyway," complained James, sprawled out on his back on the floor in the dormitory. "Can't we go to bed, I'm exhausted."

"_Prongs_," said Peter. This was all far too exciting to just _give up_ on, especially when they were so close to adding another bit to the map. Even if none of them had slept in nearly twenty hours. "You remember, Pads? When we were following Marlene McKinnon--"

"I don't know why the three of you are such stalkers," Remus put in.

"She wore a pink polka-dot bra today," said James by way of explanation.

"That's not why we were following her," said Peter hastily. Well, maybe Sirius had been. Peter had just been following Sirius.

"She stole my sandwich at lunch." Sirius poked his leg with the sharp end of the quill. "Go on, Petesy."

"Anyway--suddenly, she just disappeared. Marlene McKinnon, I mean. There was nothing else around! And you can't Disapparate on the grounds--"

"Learned something during your time here after all, did you, Pete?" said James.

Peter ignored him. "--And we've not found any kind of passage anywhere near the third floor! So there's got to be another one! And it's probably the One-Eyed Witch, right, Padfoot, because she'd been in the middle of the hall?"

"That's right, Wormtail my boy," said Sirius, if a little absently.

Peter smiled widely.

"Wouldn't the Map turn out better," tried Remus, "if we were all healthy and in possession of our wits and not, you know, sleep-deprived when we made it?"

"Essence of time!" proclaimed Sirius. "Is that the saying?"

"'Time is of the essence,'" James corrected him.

"We've got to find it soon. That way we're closer to finishing the map," said Peter. The map was his favorite of all the ideas the Marauders had come up with so far. It was even better than even being Animagi, though perhaps, as the rat, he was the only one who thought so. Anyway, people had become Animagi before, but this. A map that told you all the secrets of Hogwarts, and where everyone was inside it at all times. Nobody had done _that_ before. And if they could figure out that bit right then, someday the four of them would all look at the map, and it would be, "James found out how to get into the kitchens, Sirius found out how to get into Dumbledore's office, the Shrieking Shack was Remus's, and the statue on the third floor was Peter's."

"We're not graduating tomorrow," mumbled James.

Peter caught Remus's eye and made a face.

Remus grinned and rolled his eyes. "Come on, James," he said. "What's another hour? By the way, you're going to have a hunchback yourself someday, Padfoot," Remus warned. "All work, no play, all that."

"Very unhealthy," said Peter, waggling his fingers in the air.

"I'll be fine," Sirius replied distractedly. "I don't ever work anyway."

"Thanks for missing the irony," murmured Remus, but Sirius had gone back to tapping his quill on his cheek, thinking quietly, and didn't hear. James hummed to himself. Remus looked up at the ceiling. Peter didn't move from his chair. This was the harder part of being, you know, geniuses. The having to figure out things. Peter wasn't very good at that bit. He preferred the doing.

Suddenly, Sirius shouted, "Eureka!" and all but jumped off the bed. He was out of the door in a flash.

James moaned sleepily. "Ugh," he said. "I want to _sleep_."

"Then sleep," said Remus, who had already pulled on a coat and shoes. "Suit yourself and all."

Peter followed Remus out the door. Behind him, he heard James shuffling around and smiled to himself when he emerged with the invisibility cloak in hand. Sirius was standing in the common room, looking impatient.

"Follow me, gents," he said, brandishing his quill. He led them out the portrait hole.

The statue was a little ugly, really. Peter felt bad for the woman who inspired it. _He_ would certainly hate having _his_ face set in stone for all time if it were that hideous. Not that anyone would ever make a statue of him for any reason.

Sirius stood in front of it. He poked it with his quill. He leaned his chin in his hand and said, "Hm."

James knocked on the stone, and said, "Ooh."

Peter rolled his eyes. "Well?"

"Watch this." Sirius leaned down so that his ear was against the witch's hump. Remus and Peter gathered closer. "_Dissendium_," he said in a stage whisper.

The hump began to move.

"How did you _do_ that?" asked Peter, more than a little astonished.

Sirius blew on his fingernails. "I'm brilliant, is all. Come on, let's go inside."

"You're not that brilliant," James said.

"Wonder where it goes," said Peter, peering inside.

"We won't know till we look, will we?" For Sirius, impatience was a virtue. "Lead the way, Pettigrew!"

He was beaming enough to light the tunnel himself, but Peter put a _Lumos_ on his wand anyway and called, "Let's march, you lot!"

~*~

  
The bus appears with a loud and purple-tinted bang. Remus climbs aboard, giving a nod to Ernie and Stan. He takes a seat at the back in an uncomfortable armchair which looks as if a rainbow has been sick all over it. Apparation takes too much out of him this close to the moon, and he doesn't trust most other forms of transportation.

He puts his hand into his pocket and feels the crispness of the parchment beneath his fingers. He would read the note again, but he has the contents memorized. In fact, he's known them for a very long time.

It could be a lie. It could be a cleverly crafted joke, though what the punch line might be, Remus has no idea.

On the other hand--it might be real.

~*~

  
A Moonyless world was a very sad place indeed.

That was the lesson Sirius had learned in the first five months of fifth year, along with _it's awkward living with someone who abhors every inch of your skin_ and _don't tell secrets that you promised not to tell_. Especially the really important ones like how one of your best friends was a werewolf.

Sometimes during that painful period, Remus would ask Sirius to pass the pepper or accidentally include him in a general inquiry regarding the whereabouts of an article of clothing. For the most part, though, Peter acted as a sort of go-between and James constantly flitted between being Sirius's best friend and needing to be on Remus's good side so he could continue not getting five detentions a day.

Sirius had tried _everything_ to get Remus to forgive him, really, he had, but too much trust had been lost.

So it was easy to see why the world ground to a halt, trumpets blaring, heavens opening, the Hallelujah Chorus filling the air, when Remus suddenly decided that Sirius had repaid his debt.

Or maybe it hadn't been as loud as all that. Maybe it was more like a subtle shift in the dormitory over the length of a week and a tiny smile when Sirius passed the mustard at dinnertime, and then everything cresting over when Remus asked him for help with a Transfiguration assignment.

That was the night Sirius crawled into Remus's bed at two AM for the first time since fourth year. He didn't lie down but sat at the foot like an obedient dog, singing "Danny Boy" under his breath.

Remus stirred. "Sirius?" he whispered. "Is that you?"

Sirius cleared his throat. It was embarrassing, being caught singing an Irish folk song in one of your best mate's beds at two in the morning. "Yeah. Er. Sorry. I'll go."

"No, it's okay." Remus sat up. "Are you all right?"

_Is he all right_. Sirius looked up at the canopy of the bed and suddenly felt like crying. "I'm really sorry, Moony. I don't even, I'm just. I'm." He cleared his throat again. "_Sorry_. So sorry."

"I know," said Remus in his warm motherly voice. "I know, Padfoot. I've known for a while."

A silence settled within the flimsy velvet walls and lasted for so long that Sirius began to suspect that Remus had gone back to sleep. It was not a comfortable silence--five months of little communication and Sirius's vast insecurity put a certain strain on it. Sirius began to move away, feeling a bit like a weirdo just sitting in Remus's bed in the middle of the night, but Remus's voice suddenly broke out of the darkness, saying, "Don't."

Sirius stopped. "You're not asleep?"

"I don't want to sleep."

Sirius considered this. "Want to go somewhere with me?"

Remus didn't respond immediately. Then, "Yeah. Okay. Let's not wake up James and Peter, all right?"

Sirius donned a pair of slippers, carefully nicked the invisibility cloak from its spot between James's mattress and the footboard of his bed, and waited at the door for Moony. He felt anticipation and anxiety and excitement boiling deep in his belly, but overall, he just felt happy. He skipped a little when they reached the portrait hole.

It was a little while, after a lot of aimless walking around the castle, when Sirius realized his half-baked plan was, indeed, quite like a delicious-looking cake that, once you bit in, was actually all runny and disgusting inside.

"Where are we going?" asked Remus. He sounded as if he were trying to be polite, which was not a Moonyvoice Sirius was used to, at least not when they were alone.

"Third floor corridor," replied Sirius for no reason. He went with it anyway; sometimes with patience his half-baked plans would flesh out enough to be absolutely genius.

The corridor was cold and the January wind howled outside. Sirius never wore his bathrobe--he didn't see the point, really--but he could see why Remus did. Neither of them spoke as they shuffled along under the cloak. It was the first time in months that Sirius didn't mind that Moony wasn't saying anything to him.

The statue was just there, in all its hideous glory, a woman hunched over and squinting out of one eye.

Careful not to let the cloak show any of their body parts, Sirius tapped his wand against the statue and whispered the spell, feeling a muted sense of triumph the same way he always felt when he remembered _I discovered this_. When he stepped inside, he felt the same bubbly vertigo that always took him by surprise when he remembered the stupid slide. As he slid, he felt Remus chuckling against his back, but that was not something that happened always. It was just something that felt nice.

It was dark inside and, as they both untangled themselves from the cloak, Remus muttered _Lumos_. An appraisal of their surroundings showed seemingly eternal darkness and several bottles of alcohol glittering in the dim light. Standing in the dark with nobody else around made Sirius oddly aware of Remus like he hadn't been when they'd been walking through the castle. Sirius hated the feeling of awkwardness. It was prickly and it always made him want to _Avada Kedavra_ himself.

He began to walk, recalling the twists and turns and where you had to stoop so as not to get a concussion, and where you could walk normally. It was a while before he heard Remus speak.

"You know, I don't understand you, Sirius."

Sirius stopped, feeling a little taken aback. There was no way Remus could think he didn't understand Sirius. Remus was actually one of the very few people in the entire world who really got him at all. He turned around, dismayed. "Moony--"

"I _don't_," said Remus firmly, as if he had predicted what Sirius had been about to say. "You, you do all these _stupid_ things. You don't think. You don't listen. You just… _do_, and I don't know how you do."

Sirius wanted to say something idiotic, like, "Quite well, thank you," but thought maybe it wasn't the most appropriate time.

"You make fun of me all the time for wanting to think about things, or needing to talk things out, but I never--at least I would have _thought things through_ before doing what you did."

"Are we going to talk about this _now_?" said Sirius, feeling a little bit angry in spite of himself, in spite of wanting Moony back for good. "After five months? Do you _know_ how many times I tried to 'talk things out' with you since the beginning of the year? Remus, I tried to say sorry. You know I did. And I _am_ sorry; you said you understood, you said it was okay."

In the halfhearted light of his wand, Sirius could see Remus slide down to the floor. Sirius sat, cross-legged, across from him.

"Maybe I don't understand, then," said Remus. He sounded sad. Sirius's anger began to dissipate. "Did you want to hurt me, Padfoot? Not consciously, I think, but maybe--"

"Moony." He crawled closer to Remus. "I didn't want to hurt you. I wouldn't _ever_. All right? I was just being really, really stupid."

Remus smiled.

Sirius was so happy he could kiss someone. So he kissed the only person in sight.

That person pulled away quickly. He stood up very carefully, his eyes never leaving Sirius's.

"Padfoot--"

"Want to go to Hogsmeade, Moony?" asked Sirius, feeling odd. Some_thing_ had just happened, the way big somethings often do, and he didn't really want to think about it. "The Three Broomsticks should be open."

"Actually, I think--I think I'm going to go back to the dorm," said Remus. "You should come too, I mean, we've got class tomorrow. You're going to be really tired if you don't."

Sirius shrugged. "I guess so. I, um." He threw the invisibility cloak over the two of them. "All right then?"

"Yeah," said Remus. "I think so."

~*~

  
Remus keeps his hands in his pockets, the left curled around his wand, as he walks through the quiet little village of Hogsmeade.

It's been long time, no see, and he's forgotten how much he loves the way it makes him feel. It's a little like home. Here on this street, he can see himself and his friends, snowflakes melting on their lips and eyelashes, laughing as they walked to Zonko's. There, near the Three Broomsticks, he can see James's astonished face and butterbeer dripping from his hair after yet another eager, disastrous encounter with Lily. And here, in this alley between Honeydukes' and the post office, he remembers kisses shared with Sirius, secrets he will always keep for himself.

It's early morning so nobody is around yet, but he doesn't want to take any chances. He ducks into this familiar alley to put a Disillusionment charm on himself, just in case. Before he does, however, he takes out the note and reads it once more.

All of this could have been planned. Perhaps some Death Eater is camped out by the Shrieking Shack right now, waiting for a not-so-unsuspecting Remus to enter. This doesn't faze him. He stashes the note back into his pocket, Disillusions himself, and treks towards the shack.

~*~

  
Finding a private place to snog was hard enough in a castle full of over-hormonal and magically imbalanced teenagers, but it was even more difficult when one of your best friends was currently feeling a tiny bit needy and _would not_ leave you alone.

Ever.

"Moony, please," begged James, pretending he didn't notice his True Love, the Red-haired Vixen Lily Evans sitting not twenty feet away. "You have to know some way I can get her back."

"You never had her in the first place," Remus pointed out. He may or may not have heard a muffled chuckle coming from Lily's direction.

"That _isn't the point_," James moaned, flinging himself onto the scarlet sofa. "I will forever be heartbroken."

Lily gathered up her bag and leaned against the back of the couch. She beamed down at James. "Oh, come on, Potter. You'll just have to find some other girl to be a complete idiot for, and you can give _her_ a bouquet of knickers." She winked at him and walked up to the girls' dormitories.

Remus could hardly contain his laughter. Peter didn't at all, and fell off his chair. "You gave Evans a bouquet of _knickers_, Prongs?" he said, snorting.

"What possessed you to do _that_?" said Remus.

"I--well--" James looked lost. "Maybe I thought she needed some new ones?"

"Who doesn't need black lacy panties with the days of the week on them, I always say," said Sirius, wandering over from the other side of the room where he had just lost a game of Exploding Snap to Alice Longbottom. He sat on the arm of Remus's chair.

"They had the days of the _week_ on them," repeated Remus, feeling lightheaded. "Jesus Christ."

"Well, Jamesie, my dear friend, while you are a failure and are very much in need of Moony's help, I am afraid I must steal him for a bit."

"No, you can't! I don't know what to do!"

"You could get her a normal bouquet," Peter suggested. "Like… you know, flowers? Girls like flowers."

"Lily Evans is not a _girl_," James replied, sitting up to scowl properly at Peter. "She is--a _woman_. A _temptress_, a sultry seductress, a _red-haired nymph of the woods_. She is anything but a girl." He collapsed back onto the coach and began bemoaning his unfortunate state of affairs. Peter began listing off clichéd methods of courtship.

Sirius took advantage of their distraction to lean down and put his lips to Remus's ear. "They won't notice if we leave."

Remus grinned up at him and very carefully they both stood up and tiptoed away.

Just outside the portrait hole, Sirius bursts into laughter. "A bouquet of knickers," he says between chuckles. "You should get me one of them, Moony."

"Sorry, I don't know where to get them," said Remus. "Where shall we go, Mr. Black?"

"Well, Mr. Lupin," replied Sirius, "If I told you it wouldn't be a surprise."

"Not the Shrieking Shack?" Not that Remus wasn't thankful that the Shack existed, but it was the moon in a week and he would be spending enough time there.

"No, no," said Sirius. "You spend enough time there."

Remus's heart gave a little jump, which made him feel simultaneously stupid and happy.

Sirius linked arms with Remus and they walked up four hidden staircases, through two hidden tunnels, and argued for entry into the third floor corridor with one nine-headed cockroach.

The cockroach bit was the most difficult and afterwards, Remus announced, "I feel like going the normal way would have been a lot more effective."

Sirius's only reply was, "Where's your sense of adventure, Moony?"

Remus took his hand, his intent to keep it there just for a second, and squeezed. Sirius held tight and didn't let go until he had to, in order to slip through the crack the one-eyed witch's hump allowed.

"What was that for?" asked Remus inside, brushing off dirt he couldn't see from his trousers.

"What was what for," said Sirius. "Come on!"

It was too difficult to walk side-by-side or completely upright through most of the passage, but it got wider or taller or both in places. When they had been walking in almost complete silence (only broken once when Remus asked, "Sirius, are you taking me on a date somewhere in Hogsmeade?" and Sirius had replied with a frustratingly non-committal "Mm") for about twenty minutes, they turned a corner and one of those openings appeared.

The tunnel became less narrow here, and it stretched out to be about two meters tall instead of one, and it was about four and a half feet wide. And in the middle of this little clearing were several floating candles, enough so that Remus had to squint to get used to the light, a blanket laid out on the ground, a giant plate of sandwiches and two bottles of butterbeer, and a few books.

"Welcome to our little borrowed bedroom," said Sirius. "Virginal and spare. I'm brilliant, you know."

Remus kneeled down to look at the books. Here were _The Count of Monte Cristo, A Separate Peace_, and the first volume of the collected works of W.B. Yeats. All of Remus's favorites. _The Three Musketeers_ was there too, presumably for Sirius himself.

"Sirius Black," said he to the boy who had just sat down cross-legged behind him, "you are disgusting."

"Disgusting?" said Sirius. "Handsome, thoughtful, and the best fucking snog in the school, maybe, but never disgusting."

Overcome with a mysterious mix of blessing, incredulity, and triumph, Remus took the Yeats and turned, taking the place across from Sirius. He opened to "The Young Man's Song" and read it aloud.

"What's a penny, again?" asked Sirius, opening one of the bottles of butterbeer.

"You know," said Remus. "It's like a Knut. Muggle money. Not worth much." He bent over the book in his lap, his hair swinging over to cover his face, and traced his finger along its binding. Sometimes, Sirius did things like this, so sweet it would rot a dragon's tooth, and Remus never had any idea how to respond. He reread the lines to himself again. _I am looped in the loops of her hair._

Maybe he was thinking too much. Again.

He felt fingers on his jaw and looked up. Sirius was looking at him patiently. One corner of his lips quirked. Remus kissed that corner and then he kissed a little higher, next to Sirius's nose, and then a little lower, and his lips touched a spot on his chin.

Sirius made a sound and pressed his mouth to Remus's urgently. Remus slid his fingers into shiny, soft black hair. Sirius pushed the collection of Yeats off Remus's lap and took its place. But for Sirius's moans and Remus's hushed and heavy breathing, it was quiet, so quiet in the passage. A quiet that Remus wasn't used to, although he wanted to be.

Robes went missing and Remus slid his fingers up Sirius's shirt, pressing them against the warmth of his stomach and rubbing across one of his nipples.

He was perfectly fine with just kissing like this and could have continued forever, except that Sirius suddenly shifted a little more perceptibly in Remus's lap and their cocks brushed. At this, Remus's tiny noises accumulated into a very loud one. Sirius echoed with a sound of his own.

"Moony," he breathed. Remus felt a draft and realized Sirius was trying to tug off his jumper. Remus didn't want to stop kissing him but allowed it anyway, if it meant they could be even closer. Sirius's mouth immediately descended to his collarbone to lick across an ancient scar. "Remus."

Remus's hand moved lower and flattened against the front of Sirius's trousers, which caused Sirius to make a glorious sound. Remus hummed to himself and began unbuttoning buttons.

"Awful smug of you, Moony," whispered Sirius. He bit at Remus's neck, and Remus immediately howled in pain before a tongue was dragging across the skin. It hadn't hurt that much anyway.

The way Sirius was purposefully moving his hips, and the way Remus was much, much harder than he remembered being in a long time, and the way Remus was pushing his fingers beneath the elastic of Sirius's pants--these things were almost getting into territory that they hadn't covered yet. It was an issue of time and more than a little fear from both sides, but at this moment, they had all the time in the world--not that it would take that long--and maybe the way Sirius looked right then, all bright and lovely in the candlelight, maybe that would appease some of Remus's fear.

_One cannot begin it too soon_, Remus told himself, and wrapped his fingers around Sirius' cock and squeezed. His fingers were immediately wet. Sirius dropped his head and rested it on Remus's shoulder.

"Padfoot?" he asked, wiping his hand on Sirius's jeans.

"Nghk," said Sirius desperately, kissing Remus's neck. "Wait."

Remus ignored this command. He mouthed Sirius's jaw and traced squiggles across skin on his back, arms, stomach; they were horizontal now and Sirius's hair was in Remus's eye before Sirius began to move, kissing Remus's Adam's apple, the skin that ran into his armpit, along a scar that ran from his shoulder to just underneath his left nipple. He licked down his belly, rubbed his nose in the hair leading down into his trousers.

Remus watched, astounded and mesmerized, as Sirius unbuttoned his trousers and pulled both those and Remus's pants down. And it was just there, his cock, and Remus wasn't really used to this. He also wasn't used to Sirius meeting his eyes for one brief and breathless moment before that wonderful, brilliant, ass of a boy closed his lips around the tip. Remus couldn't help it when his eyes fell shut.

He felt himself being reduced to sensation: his fingers as he pushed through Sirius's messy hair, warmth where his leg curled around the other boy's, and, above all, Sirius's tongue curled around him and Sirius's thumb pressing against a vein and how _good_ it all felt.

He clenched his fingers tighter in Sirius's hair. Sirius licked all the way up and wrapped his lips around the tip of Remus's cock one more time and sucked. Remus was completely gone.

He squinted one eye open and smiled down at Sirius. He crawled back up Remus's body and kissed him on the forehead. "Good idea?"

"Padfoot," said Remus, a little breathlessly. "For someone who normally comes up with such terrible ideas, this was simply amazing."

"It's a bit dark. And cold," said Sirius with the castaway concern he affected whenever he was a little nervous, "and it smells like mud that's been stamped through by twelve shit-covered Erumpents--"

"It's not someplace I would come back to time and time again," agreed Remus. "But it was a good idea."

"You wouldn't come back? No clandestine rendezvous signaled by surreptitiously delivered notes saying 'Meet me at the statue in an hour'? It would be so romantic, Remus." He pressed his nose, surprisingly cold after so much heat, into the juncture between Remus's neck and shoulder. Remus slapped the back of Sirius's head.

Sirius moved, allowing Remus to sit up and put his jumper back on, because it was cold in the passageway when you didn't have a ten stone seventeen-year-old boy in your lap.

"Hey, Sirius." Remus stacked the books carefully on the edge of the blanket. "How did you know my favorite books?"

"You've read that peace one ten times," said Sirius by way of explanation. "You think I don't know you, Moony."

"No," said Remus. "I think you know me too well."

"Do I," said Sirius, and stuffed half a sandwich into his mouth.

~*~

  
The Shrieking Shack is as unwelcoming as ever, but that's a quaint characteristic that Remus has always found a little endearing.

He _has_ spent too much time here, but some of that time was spent very well indeed. He was happy here, once, with his friends. He remembers the night they showed him their Animagus forms. None of them said a word about how tears had poured out of his eyes, because that's what you do when one of your mates is maybe crying.

He feels a little now like he did then, like his friends' goodness was too wonderful to be anything but a dream. Maybe the crumpled parchment in his pocket is part of another, different dream. Maybe he's not walking through the grey, heartbroken shack, but rather sleepwalking through the house on Grimmauld Place.

He trips over a loose floorboard and stubs his toe. It hurts.

Maybe it's not a dream after all. He isn't sure whether the fact that he feels a little better makes him a maniac or not.

~*~

  
Lily's uncanny perceptiveness--if perceptiveness indeed it was; James had a lurking suspicion that his girlfriend was mostly a nosey snoop--was known to spring up on James at unexpected times. Like how she always seemed to know when he fucked up and how she so often caught him at the exact moment of execution of some prank or another.

One day, they were sitting by the lake studying (that is, _Lily_ was studying and James was reading the latest issue of _Bonkers for Broomsticks_) and Lily just looked up and said, "I know that you and your friends didn't come back to Gryffindor until early this morning."

James nearly fell over from shock. It had been a full moon the night before. They had gotten in later than usual because Sirius had insisted as always that they stay with Moony until Pomfrey had fixed him all up except Moony had gotten a bit more messed up than normal.

"I know about the cloak, James," continued Lily. "I don't care, obviously. But you lot are going to get into grand trouble if you're out all hours of the night."

"It was nothing," James said. "I mean, yeah, we were out, but we know better than to get into trouble."

Lily raised an unconvinced eyebrow but went back to reading about ancient runes.

James was a little afraid. He didn't think Lily of all people would care if she discovered about Remus's little furry problem but Remus might mind if Lily found out. There was that horrible five months in fifth year when he'd stopped talking to Sirius because Snape had discovered the secret.

James, however, unlike Sirius, had a very large capacity for brilliant ideas. One came to him watching Lily read a book about nocturnal magical animals.

"_Fine_," he said, all bravery and reluctance. "Fine, Lily. I'll tell you. See, Sirius and I have been sneaking out."

"That's impossible," said Lily. "You'd get caught a million times."

"Well, we haven't. We found a passageway, you see. I can show you if you want."

Lily smiled. As if James could fight _that_.

Later that night, James sneaked out of the dormitory, carrying the invisibility cloak and the Marauder's Map. He planned to keep the latter a secret; that was one thing he couldn't share, no matter how much he loved his girlfriend.

Lily met him in the common room, looking excited. "I wish I had an electric torch," she whispered. "It would be like all the 'adventures' Petunia and I used to have, when we were convinced there were secrets in the walls of our house."

"Were there?" asked James, making sure the cloak covered both of them completely. They had to huddle a little close, but he didn't mind that too much.

"No," said Lily. "Just a whole lot of insulation. One time we got into a lot of trouble for knocking into a wall with a hammer."

James suddenly felt a singular, ebullient note of pride in the redheaded girl next to him.

Together, they shuffled out of the common room and up a few hidden staircases, stopping once for several lovely minutes to answer to the demands of a delinquent two-month-old sprig of mistletoe and then some.

He brought her to the One-Eyed Witch, whom he could almost swear winked at him. Sometimes, Hogwarts meant you were in for a lot of being creeped out.

"This is it?" said Lily, sounding a little disappointed.

"Well, we're not finished yet, are we," replied James, tapping his wand against the witch's hump. "_Dissendium_."

"Interesting spell choice," said Lily.

"What makes you say that?" James stepped into the darkness, putting a Lumos on his wand. "By the way, watch it, there's a sli--" but he was already on his way down.

Lily crashed into him shortly after he reached the bottom. "Thanks for the warning," she said. She kissed the nape of hair on the back of his neck before pushing herself up anyway.

"I tried," he said without much fervor. "Anyway, why's it interesting?"

She lighted her own wand and looked around. "It means 'to sever,'" she replied, distracted. "This is incredible. How did you guys find this?"

"I don't even remember," said James. "I think it was Peter, though. Something about Marlene McKinnon."

"Hogwarts, Hogwarts, hoggy warty Hogwarts," sang Lily, shining her light all around, "Teach us something please _indeed_. I can't believe this is here. I wonder how long it's been around." She knelt down next to the bottom of the stone slide to better examine it.

"I was going to show you the rest, you know," James said. "It leads to Hogsmeade, so I was even thinking we could go to--"

"Oh, James, look! Someone's scratched their initials here."

James didn't really care all that much, but Lily's excitement was both endearing and contagious. He knelt down next to her. "R plus S," he read aloud.

"I wonder," said Lily, her eyes glittering with ideas, "if maybe R is Rowena Ravenclaw and S is Salazar Slytherin. I wonder if they were together."

James shrugged. "I imagine it would be in the history books, then, wouldn't it?"

"Like you would know what's in the history books," she said, one of her freckled hands on his knee. She sat on the slide and leaned her chin in her palm. "It would be romantic. Maybe nobody was supposed to know they were in love."

"I don't know how people could keep anything like that secret," said James. "Me, I want to tell everyone."

Lily looked at him with that special expression. The one that _made_ him want to tell everyone that he and Lily Evans were in love. "Thanks for showing me this, James."

"Figured I can't keep _all_ my secrets from you." He smiled and stood up. "Hey, so. Do you think Madam Puddifoot would hate us forever if we came into her tea shop this late?"

"Maybe not if we don't mock it as much as we normally do," replied Lily, accepting his proffered hand. "We won't know until we try!"

Madam Puddifoot didn't hate them forever, after all, although there was definitely something wrong with James's tea that night.

~*~

  
Remus hurries up several hidden staircases and exits from behind a tapestry of Romolo the Riveted. He stops.

The One-Eyed Witch stands there, in the middle of the third floor corridor, keeping guard over her secrets the way she's been doing for centuries.

There is nobody waiting for him.

This knowledge doesn't so much hit him as drip slowly into his consciousness, and it feels like ice cold water is dripping little by little, without pattern, into his stomach. When it comes to full realization, all he wants, the _only thing_ that he wants, is to lie down and sleep forever.

_Meet me at the statue in an hour._

Well, it could be a lie. It could be a joke. It could be a hallucination or part of an evil scheme. It could also be, and this is the most likely possibility, that Remus just wants so fucking much for what is true to be false, what is real to be pretend, that the definitions have all switched places in his mind.

He reaches inside his pocket to feel the crispness of the paper. Is _that_ real at all?

Sirius had been reading _The Three Musketeers_ and using the note as a bookmark.

Just last week.

Remus remembers now.

He turns around slowly, hands in pockets, and heads back the way he's come. He'll go back to Grimmauld Place, now, and have a cup of tea, maybe.

He won't cry, though well he may.


End file.
